Crated, a design consultancy and R&D lab, is in the process of changing the way electronic dance music fans listen to and experience music. Enter the Sync shirt, “an audio responsive VJ Shirt” that pulses via an LED patch according to the music’s intensity. A response to the increasingly elaborate visuals that DJs use during live performances, the Sync VJ shirt encourages users to physically become a part of the light shows before them.

What sets the Sync shirt apart from other sound-activated products is its elimination of wires, which are often used to create audio responsive clothing. Along with BotFactor and Squink the printing technology that made Sync possible, Crated was able to devise a super thin and ductile circuit board that is printed directly onto the shirt’s patch. It took an impressive 24 hours for the two companies to construct Sync due to Squink’s rapid-fire capabilities.

“Sync was a collaboration inspired by BotFactory’s Squink,” says Madison Maxey, CTO at Crated. “We had met the team about a month earlier and were so impressed by the implications for Squink, especially after we had run into come frustrating PCB troubles with an earlier project. We were excited to see BotFactory crowdfunding and decided to propose a collaboration using Squink boards in wearable technology, as they’re exceptionally flexible and really beautiful if properly designed.”

BotFactory’s motivation behind the circuit board printer was to design a product that was less expensive and time-consuming, as electronics fabrication is no easy process. Squink’s cutting-edge technology allows for boards to be printed on paper, further permitting Sync shirt’s patch to be transferred to other articles of clothing without added wiring.